


Revelations

by trustingHim17



Category: Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Gen, Mycroft is more observant, Observations
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-08-18
Packaged: 2021-03-06 04:27:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,472
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25927378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trustingHim17/pseuds/trustingHim17
Summary: Holmes learns something new about Watson, and it confuses him—majorly.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 32





	1. Chapter 1

“Leave me behind.”

He made no answer, and they continued staggering up the street.

“Watson, they are getting closer. Leave me behind.”

Ignoring the man limping next to him, Watson glanced back to check their pursuer’s progress.

Their pursuers _were_ gaining. They needed to move faster if they did not want to be caught, but he would not leave Holmes behind.

“Watson—”

“No!” he finally snapped, resettling Holmes’ arm over his shoulders. “You should know better than to even _suggest_ that.”

A huff of annoyance carried through the dusk. “Hide me in an alley. They will not find me, and you can come back with help.”

His thoughts raced, ignoring the outrageous idea even as he acknowledged that they were moving too slowly. Holmes was using him as a crutch, limping on what Watson suspected was a broken ankle from falling down an embankment. It was his fault they were in this predicament to begin with. He would not leave Holmes behind while he ran for safety, and there was no way he would be able to take down the gang that followed them—not alone.

He looked around. Was there a cart they could use? He hated the thought of stealing, but if the ruffians behind them caught up, they would have much bigger problems than having stolen a cart, and they could always return it in the morning.

“Watson.” Holmes’ words were getting more breathless, and he tried to take his arm off Watson’s shoulder.

“I am not leaving you behind, Holmes. Stop suggesting it.” He hefted Holmes’ arm higher over his shoulder, and the movement gave him an idea. He glanced back. The gang was out of sight for the moment, but he could hear them on the last street. He would have to readjust quickly.

Stopping in the darkest shadows, he pulled Holmes’ arm completely over his shoulder with one hand and wrapped his other arm around Holmes’ waist, lifting Holmes’ weight high enough that his bad ankle barely brushed the ground even if he extended it. This was harder to do when the other person was taller than him, as Holmes was, but it should work.

“What are you doing?”

He ignored the question, making sure he had a firm grip on his friend and taking a deep breath.

“Keep your feet beneath you,” he warned, and, just before the gang turned the corner onto their street, he started running, grateful his leg had not been bothering him for the last few days.

Pain lanced through his side, but he ignored it, more focused on keeping Holmes pinned against him. Holmes quickly figured out a rhythm and kept his good foot beneath him, helping as much as he could, and they turned off one street and ran up another. Watson breathed a sigh of relief as a familiar house came into view, and he stopped only to pound on the door.

“Mr. Holmes!”

Still breathless from the sprint and the pain of jarring his injury, Holmes pointed at a barely noticeable box to Watson’s left.

“No time,” he panted. “Get the key.”

With Holmes using the wall to maintain his balance, Watson quickly followed Holmes’ directions to open the box and inserted the key into the lock. A moment later, the door closed behind them, and Watson breathed a sigh of relief. The gang had not yet turned onto their street, and it would be difficult for them to know which house he and Holmes had entered.

Mycroft rounded the corner as the lock clicked, his initial irritation at the intrusion on his routine quickly being replaced by muted concern as he saw the way Holmes listed to keep his weight off his ankle.

“What happened?”

“I blew our cover,” Watson answered, the self-recrimination showing in his tone as he helped Holmes limp to the settee. “We fought long enough to escape, but there were too many.”

“Six—” Holmes cut off as his foot brushed the settee. “Six are following us,” he got out around his hiss of pain. “I doubt they will track us here.”

“You are too old for me to still have to pull you out of trouble, Sherlock.”

Watson laughed faintly. “Your brother will never outgrow finding trouble, Mr. Holmes.”

“I have told you before to call me Mycroft,” he chided.

Holmes tried to frown at them, but it turned into a grimace as he leaned into the cushions, and Watson smirked but nodded, turning his attention to the injury he had caused.

“Mycroft, then. Do you have any bandages? Splints? Anything I can use to treat his ankle?”

“Just a moment.” Mycroft stepped out of the room, returning a few seconds later with a small medical kit in hand.

Watson’s surprise at the formal kit showed in his expression, but he said nothing, merely nodding his thanks as he catalogued what was available. Finding splinting material as well as amble bandages, he focused on Holmes.

“Cooper—” Holmes cut off as Watson manipulated the bones in his ankle, grimacing in pain, but Watson realized what he had been trying to say.

“Cooper is short, stocky, and wearing dark clothing,” Watson announced as Mycroft watched him form a splint to hold Holmes’ ankle straight. “He has dark hair, is probably limping, and he definitely has a gun. The five men with him are all taller and wearing loose overcoats of some sort with a hood they had pulled over their faces. One or two of them might have guns, but at least one has a knife. They are nearly impossible to tell apart, however, so I have no idea which one it is that I saw carrying the blade.”

“I— doubt they will track us here,” Holmes said again, fighting to speak around the pain of Watson bandaging his ankle. “They were barely keeping up when we were moving slowly.”

“More like you hope they do not track us here,” Watson corrected as he wrapped a bandage around the splint. “You are no match for even one or two men right now, much less the six or seven we can usually handle together.”

“How can the two of you possibly handle six or seven?”

Watson glanced up at Mycroft’s tone. “Side to side and back to back,” he said with a smirk, remembering where he had first heard the term. “We cannot exactly rely on the Yard arriving in time. Genius here despises even letting them know where we are.”

Holmes harrumphed. “London’s finest are rarely fine enough to arrive when they would be useful. They arrive later, inconveniently, and spoil everything.”

Watson frowned, putting the supplies away as he replied. “They would have been useful today,” he pointed out. “You might not have a broken ankle if they had been there. With how much you hate bedrest, I would think you would make more of an effort to remain uninjured.”

Holmes rolled his eyes at the half-teasing rebuke but made no reply as Mycroft stepped out of the room. The elder Holmes returned a moment later, and footsteps sounded outside.

Watson’s head shot up, his focus darting from the medical kit in front of him to the door.

“It is the Yard, Doctor.” Watson glanced over at Mycroft to find the older man staring at him, obviously having noticed him slip into battle-readiness.

Holmes leaned back into the settee and closed his eyes, smirking. “Your boss finally overruled your wishes and assigned guards?”

“A few weeks ago,” came the irritated reply. “They have been a nuisance since day one.”

Watson smirked, finally relaxing as his focus shifted back to the medical kit in front of him. They were safe. “I think your boss put the guards on the wrong brother, especially if this is the first time they have had anything to do.”

Holmes huffed, but Mycroft cut off any reply Holmes would have made.

“Which one of you is bleeding?”


	2. Chapter 2

“Bleeding?” Holmes opened his eyes to see Mycroft glancing between them, and Holmes noticed the bloody footprint on the previously clean floor. He frowned, a portion of the fight coming to mind.

A flash of steel. A shout. Someone shoving him, making him trip and roll down the embankment.

He spun around to look at Watson, only to find him leaning heavily against the armchair closest to the settee.

“Watson?”

“I’m fine, Holmes. I’m just…” the words trailed off, and Mycroft lunged forward barely in time to prevent the doctor from slumping to the floor.

“You are just injured, you mean to say,” Holmes said, the scowl on his face not covering the concern in his gaze as his brother helped his friend into a chair. “Why did you not say anything?”

“Didn’t realize until a moment ago.” The reply was quiet, but Watson was moving, digging through the medical kit for another round of bandages.

“How do you not realize you are injured?” Mycroft’s question broke into the budding argument, and Holmes glanced over in surprise. Mycroft had not seen the two of them together more than a handful of times, but Holmes had described Watson’s concentration in anything similar to battle before. Why would Mycroft ask a question to which he already knew the answer?

“My fault.” Watson’s words were clipped with pain and weakness as he exposed a gash on his side. “Had to get him out.”

“It was not your fault,” Holmes said, wishing his ankle did not prevent him from standing.

“I blew our cover,” Watson answered shortly, his sigh of self-recrimination mixing with a grimace as he tried to look at the injury. The cut was long, obviously the result of a thrust rather than a slash, and Holmes swallowed. If that had been an inch over…

Holmes watched him struggle for a moment, quickly realizing that the cut was too deep to simply bandage, but it was too far back for Watson to see properly. With his bad shoulder, he could barely reach the wound to bandage it, much less suture the wound closed.

“Watson, let me help.”

“You can barely stand,” Watson muttered in reply, and Holmes finally registered how wet Watson’s clothes were. The cut must have never stopped bleeding after the fight, to have soaked his clothes so badly and left bloody footprints in his wake.

Wait. Bloody footprints.

A scuffle sounded outside, and Holmes groaned. That was why Cooper’s gang had been lagging so far behind in their pursuit. There was no reason for speed when Watson’s injury had been leaving a trail for them to follow.

Mycroft’s amusement carried in his tone, subtle yet glaringly obvious to Holmes. “Do not worry. There are enough men out there that your six pursuers will be in a cell come morning.”

Relaxing at Mycroft’s assurances, Holmes turned back to find Watson still weakly struggling with a bandage. Holding a compress to the wound left him no way to anchor the bandage, but he could not take pressure off the compress without the wound bleeding freely.

Ignoring Watson’s admonition to stay seated, that he was fine, he pulled himself upright and half-limped, half-crawled to the chair.

“Stubborn,” he chided as he fought to crouch by his friend’s side without putting weight on his splinted ankle. It was much easier to move around with the break stable.

Watson made no answer, and Holmes took over, holding the compress as he removed some basic suturing material from Mycroft’s kit.

The wound was long, but clean, and it was only the work of a few minutes to suture it closed and bandage it. He was putting the supplies away when he glanced up to see that Watson’s eyes had closed.

“Watson?” Watson never moved, and Holmes noticed the doctor’s breathing had quickened. He tried again. “Watson, answer me.”

Slowly, so slowly that Holmes was about to look for a pulse, Watson turned his head towards Holmes’ voice, mumbling something unintelligible.

“Stay awake, Watson.”

“Try’g,” came the faint mumble.

Footsteps sounded outside, and someone knocked on the door in a pattern. Mycroft went to answer it as Holmes stared at Watson, a frown of worry on his face. The wound had not been bleeding heavily, but Watson’s clothes attested to how much blood the doctor had lost. Did he need to get Watson to a hospital? Or would he be fine after some rest now that the wound had been treated?

Mycroft’s voice got louder, and he glanced over to see Lestrade walking through the doorway. He nodded a greeting before returning his gaze to Watson.

A constable entered on the heels of Lestrade’s greeting, and the Inspector’s entire demeanor changed from curious acquaintance to dutiful Inspector. Opening a notebook and barely glancing in Holmes’ direction, he said, “I just came in to get your statement, Mr. Holmes. The other Mr. Holmes said these men are part of a gang?” He glanced up for a response, and his gaze finally landed on Watson’s slumped form. The aloof Inspector façade dropped, and before Holmes could answer the original question, Lestrade added, “Does he need a hospital?”

Holmes shook his head, still watching Watson with concern even as he made his decision. “Just rest, I think. He got the worst of our escape.”

“Shall I call a cab for you?”

Holmes hesitated but nodded. “That would probably be best. He will rest better at home than propped up in an armchair.”

“Tell Harris out there to call in a cleaning service, as well,” Mycroft said, having come up as Lestrade asked the question. He eyed the stains on the floor in distaste, but Holmes noticed his gaze kept straying to where Watson was slouched in the armchair. “Is he supposed to be that tired?”

Lestrade stepped out to call a cab, leaving the statement to wait until later, and Holmes frowned but nodded, his gaze still on Watson. “A side effect of blood loss is heavy fatigue.” He paused. “But I do not like how quickly that hit.”

“You were in danger until just a few minutes prior, Sherlock,” Mycroft rumbled. “You said the doctor was a soldier. He would not have relaxed until you were safe. He said himself that he did not even notice the injury until he nearly collapsed.”

“’Until _I_ was safe?’” Holmes repeated. Not ‘until he was safe’?

“You have not noticed?”

Holmes’ frown deepened, and he glanced up. “Noticed what?” Was this why Watson had refused to leave him to go for help?

Mycroft released a hint of an enigmatic smile as they heard Lestrade at the door to announce the cab.

“You are more than his friend, Sherlock. You are his brother.”

Lestrade entered the room, and Holmes’ focus shifted to getting Watson home and settled, but Mycroft’s words rang in his mind for much of the night.

Watson considered him a brother?

**Author's Note:**

> Feedback is always greatly appreciated :)


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